Sigma 35mm f1.4 DG HSM A Canon review: A Prime Example of Lens Design

Sigma 35mm F1.4 DG HSM faces competition: one of the best 35mm

Most photographers buying a lens will look first at the offerings that the camera maker has, Canon lenses for a Canon Camera. Then they will buy what they can afford. This Sigma 35mm f1.4 DG HSM A would make this a very bad strategy.

With higher sharpness, lower distortion, better transmission and lower chromatic aberration than its main rivals. Only in vignetting does it fail to excel, having a 2 stop fall off in the corners when used at full aperture, though this is also true of the others. It is not just in the sharpness scores where the Sigma excels: the DxO Mark scores place the Sigma at just over 30, the f2 Carl Zeiss lens at 27 and the Samyang f1.4 lenses at 26 and 23 respectively.

From a price perspective the Sigma is the second cheapest of this group, about 50% more than the Samyang 35mm f1.4 AS UMC. However, the Samyang, like the more expensive Carl Zeiss Distagon T 35mm f2 and the much more expensive Carl Zeiss Distagon T 35mm F1.4 ZE lens is not fitted with an autofocus motor which the Sigma and Canon’s own EF 35mm f1.4L are.

P-MPix relative to price for 35mm lenses mounted on a Canon EOS 5D MkII. The Sigma, alone at the top and well away from the right hand end of the graph is a real star!

When you add to this that Samyang’s 35mm lens fails to deliver anything like the sharpness and loses about 2/3 of a stop of transmission: it does not look like such a bargain. In build quality the Zeiss lenses have a great feel, using traditional materials in a way that is likely to mean they will retain their value well. The performance of the Zeiss lenses is very good but even the version at f2 is still more expensive than the better performing Sigma.

Sharpness compared between the three f1.4 lenses shows the sigma as the best performer, a position it maintains throughout the aperture range

The score for resolution of the Sigma lens was 17.3 P-MPix making it one of the sharpest lenses available for the Canon EOS 5D Mk II. At f2.8 the lens performs almost consistently from corner to corner, but since an f1.4 lens is often bought to be used wide open it is impressive to see that thequality is maintained at a good level even for f1.4. Zeiss’s 35mm f2 scored 14.5 P-MPix and the Samyang 35mm F1.4 scored 11.5 P-MPix

Further readings for the Sigma 35mm f1.4 DG HSM A Canon review: A Prime Example of Lens Design

To provide photographers with a broader perspective about mobiles, lenses and cameras, here are links to articles, reviews, and analyses of photographic equipment produced by DxOMark, renown websites, magazines or blogs.

As the first model in Sigma’s high-grade ART series the 35mm f1.4 HSM A set the bar very high for image quality when measured on Canon and Nikon bodies. The lens is also available in Sony mount, and we couldn’t resist trying it on the excellent Sony A99. Read on to see how well it performs.

The second in our series of selecting the best-quality lenses for your camera concentrates on one of the most highly-anticipated cameras of our time, the successor to the hugely popular EOS 5D Mark II. But by the time it was announced, in early March, it’s probably fair to say Nikon had taken fair amount of interest away by announcing the 36M-Pix D800 and D800E models the month before. Be that as it may, there’s no denying the 22.3 M-Pix EOS 5D Mark III is a remarkably capable camera, and a formidable rival to the Nikon.

Sigma has produced some really fine lenses over the past few years, including the 50mm F1.4 EX DG HSM (which we liked a lot when we reviewed it in 2008) and the 85mm F1.4 EX DG HSM. But the 35mm F1.4 DG HSM may possibly be its best yet. In fact it's one of those rare lenses for which finding any fault seems almost churlish, so good is its overall performance.